CloudChase

Four children have raided the dressing-up box and gone out to do some honest work in space. A colander. A cardboard rocket. A bedsheet cape. A borrowed high-vis jacket. Everything in this game is home-made except the planets, which are the only real things in it. You start on 100 clouds. You roll, and you move exactly what you rolled, in any direction you like. That last part is the whole game. There is no track carrying you along, so every roll is a decision. Work pays 50. You help the elderly stars, you drive space cargo, you clean the moon cars. Robbers take 75 if you cannot beat them, but they leave alone anyone down to their last 50, so nobody is ever ruined and nobody is ever out. Then there are the planets. Mars costs 100 to take on and pays 300. The black hole wants 500 to let anyone past, and everyone at the table can see whether you can pay it. Jupiter costs 200, and beating…